"The central doctrine of Christianity, then, is not that God is a bastard. It is, in the words of the late Dominican theologian Herbert McCabe, that if you don’t love you’re dead, and if you do, they’ll kill you."--Terry Eagleton

"It is impossible for me to say in my book one word about all that music has meant in my life. How then can I hope to be understood?--Ludwig Wittgenstein

“The opposite of poverty is not wealth; the opposite of poverty is justice."--Bryan Stevenson

Thursday, December 14, 2017

While We're Getting Literary

“I’m riffing here,” the speaker admitted, before listing three bullet points of “things we’re trying to do right now to get this economy humming to reach its potential”: Fixing the “regulatory problem,” passing Republicans’ bill to slash taxes for corporations and the wealthy, and people.

“People,” Ryan said bluntly. “This is going to be the new economic challenge for America. People. Baby boomers are retiring. I did my part, but, you know, we need to have higher birth rates in this country, meaning, baby boomers are retiring and we have fewer people following them in the work force.”

I profess, in the sincerity of my heart, that I have not the least personal interest in endeavouring to promote this necessary work, having no other motive than the publick good of my country, by advancing our trade, providing for infants, relieving the poor, and giving some pleasure to the rich. I have no children, by which I can propose to get a single penny; the youngest being nine years old, and my wife past child-bearing.

Paul Ryan recommends some smooth jazz ("riffing") to get Millenials in the mood to start making babies; the economy needs bodies!

Will Paul Ryan support feeding, healing, educating and caring for these children? Of course not. That is someone else's responsibility, certainly not his or those he represents (and I don't mean his constituents, I mean the billionaires). Ryan and those he represents only want to take the grain that those children will have sown when grown. We are in the age of stripping of assets. Companies are taken over and stripped of their assets (net investment in companies is negative, growth had come through loading companies with debt), the same people through politics are trying to strip the assets of our schools, national parks, (charter schools, selling or giving away public assets, tax breaks and free infrastructure for private business, etc.) all that this public. They are stripping the assets of the people by debt, usury, fraud (just look at Devos' latest push, take away interest payments on student debt while in school, let for profit colleges exploit their students with no recourse). Now they want more warm bodies so they have more to exploit. Avarice, gluttony, greed personified.